Descens
by Taivasalla
Summary: An exploration of the potential future and the consequences of love. #1: NaruHina. Interconnected oneshots.


Disclaimer: I don't own_ Naruto._

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**Descens**

_An Exploration of the Potential Future_

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The day Uzumaki Naruto married Hyuuga Hinata was a day of village-wide celebration and feasting. The Rokudaime Hokage had a bride. The sun shone and streamers of green and blue and red and orange hung all around the Hokage Tower and the streets. Everyone agreed that Hinata's smile outshone even that splendor.

She spent the evening in the hospital with Sakura, Shizune, Tsunade and dozens of machines at her side, monitoring every breath and beat of her heart, every flicker of chakra and pulse of blood. Naruto held her hand and refused to leave as the pain rose and crested, lifted her into the disjointed world of blazing green agony.

Kakashi and Kurenai stood outside the door and their combined killing intent was enough to keep Hiashi from coming in to check on his work.

In retaliation, Hiashi commanded Hanabi not to visit her sister.

Neji hugged Hinata for the first time in their lives the morning after, when Naruto had finally fallen asleep in a chair by her bed, fingers still entwined with his wife's. She clung to her cousin with her free arm, twisting her hand into his long hair and not crying.

It scared Neji, because Hinata had never been so cold.

She was released from the hospital in three days, and never covered up the seal. She wore the emerald fetter bare, not in pride, but in defiance. _See, you tried to bind me, but instead I am free. _

Her first child, a son with blond hair and white eyes, was born a year later.

She named him Hizashi, and smiled when Neji told her how her father had flinched. It wasn't a happy smile, and Neji responded in kind.

Hizashi grew up strong, a prodigy of sorts, with his father's prankster mentality and his mother's quiet devotion. Hinata turned into the doting mother everyone had expected, but surprised them all when she was far less protective than Naruto over her son's well-being. "He has to learn to be strong," she said simply, and let him go to the Academy and play and fight as he willed.

Her one concession to Hizashi's position as the son of the Hokage was to agree to employ Tobitake Tonbo as his private tutor.

Tonbo had never taught anyone in his life, but he agreed. It was his Hokage asking, after all. And, if he could give another the second chance he had been offered, who was he to refuse?

The Council pressured the Rokudaime over his decision to let his son attend the Ninja Academy. 'You'd let a blind boy become a ninja,' they said incredulously, 'Are you insane?'

Naruto squared his jaw and faced them with the stubborn determination that had made him a genin, and then pushed him up until he lived his dream of being Hokage. 'Tobitake is blind,' he pointed out, 'so obviously it can be done.'

'He was a ninja before he lost his sight,' they countered. 'You can't expect Hizashi to be as good as normal children.'

When Naruto told that to Hinata, late at night when Hizashi was sleeping peacefully in his own room, she clenched the blankets until her hands were as white as her eyes. "He'll be _better_ than the other children." And later, when Naruto was almost asleep, he thought he heard her say one more thing. Something about the Hyuuga. Something... but he couldn't hear, and fell asleep before he could ask.

It would have been easy for Hinata to hate the Hyuuga, to hate them with more intensity than Neji ever had. But when her father died, she found the grace to weep at his funeral.

Hinata was going as blind as her son. Naruto knew, and Sakura as her medic. Hiashi had condemned her to it, but by the time her wide eyes only saw darkness he had been dead two years. Hanabi led the clan, now.

They knew, but Neji was the only one who truly understood. And though he wore the Primary Seal, the Caged Bird, because of her, the resentment against Hinata had drained from him long ago. Now, he pitied his cousin.

Activating Byakugan hurried the decay of her sight. The Secondary Seal was systematically erasing the Hyuuga bloodline from her body, preventing her from passing the genes to out-clan children.

Naruto railed against the unfairness, searched for ways to remove it or stop it or punish the Clan. Hinata put a soft hand on his arm and whispered. _I__t's ok__ay, don't worry, Naruto. It was worth it for us to be together._ And he cried into her hair and apologized over and over and over for not protecting her.

Her last sight, that she treasured through the years of darkness, was of Naruto whirling Hizashi through the air, backed against the blue sky, their golden hair shining in the sunlight.

To Hinata, her husband and her son were worth losing her sight a hundred times over for. They were worth the loss of her clan, and they were worth the pain as the seal ate away her eyes and her body until she had not the strength to leave her bed.

They were her two loves, and she gave them her heart and her life.


End file.
